The chief judge of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court criticized the FBI over its surveillance-application process in a rare public order -- and the mainstream media largely ignored it.
The secretive court scolded the FBI for FISA abuses that surfaced in the recent Inspector General report, a powerful rebuke of the bureau deemed unworthy of coverage by prominent news organizations.
ABC’s “World News Tonight,” NBC’s “Nightly News” and CBS’ “Evening News” all skipped the story, according to the Media Research Center.
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“A complete and total blackout. That was how ABC, CBS, and NBC reacted on their Tuesday evening newscasts,” MRC news analyst Nicholas Fondacaro wrote. “Instead of reporting on this damning order by the top FISC judge, the broadcast networks were salivating over impeachment.”
CNN completely skipped the story during the primetime hours of 8-11 p.m. ET, too, according to a search of transcripts.
And while CNN spent the evening fixated on impeachment, MSNBC briefly mentioned the IG report and FISA process but didn’t specifically dive into the FISC criticizing the FBI.
Presiding Judge Rosemary M. Collyer gave the FBI until Jan. 10 to come up with solutions, in the wake of findings from Justice Department IG Michael E. Horowitz, who issued a withering report about the wiretapping of Carter Page, a former campaign adviser to President Trump.
The FISC has dealt with some of the most sensitive matters of national security: terror threats and espionage. Its work, for the most part, cannot be examined by the American public, by order of Congress and the president. Its work has been mostly secret, its structure largely one-sided – which makes Judge Collyer’s public scolding even more newsworthy.
"The FBI's handling of the Carter Page applications, as portrayed in the [Office of Inspector General] report, was antithetical to the heightened duty of candor described above," Collyer wrote in her four-page order. "The frequency with which representations made by FBI personnel turned out to be unsupported or contradicted by information in their possession, and with which they withheld information detrimental to their case, calls into question whether information contained in other FBI applications is reliable."
While Collyer's order did not specify exactly what reforms the FBI needed to implement to its policies for obtaining permission to wiretap people under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA, the order did say that the FISA court will weigh in on whether the reforms are deemed sufficient.
"The [FISA court] expects the government to provide complete and accurate information in every filing with the court," Collyer wrote. "Without it, the [FISA court] cannot properly ensure that the government conducts electronic surveillance for foreign intelligence purposes only when there is a sufficient factual basis."
Fox News’ Andrew O’Reilly and Bill Mears contributed to this report.
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